animations options are confusing

[delfick]

Excuse me @delfick for coming back so soon ^^. Could you tell what's wrong with the "fade_in_speed" syntax? I haven't been able to set that neither the twinkles_color_range field... I can't figure out the proper syntax

thanks

EDIT

Sorry I forgot to add one of my numerours attempts, but I can't get it to work. Could you please share an example for the animations options? thanks

Originally posted by @obaldius in #82 (comment)

[delfick]

So the extent of animations docs is here https://photons.delfick.com/animations/commands.html and the way of doing that from interactor (instead of photons directly from cli) isn't documented so well on photons.delfick.com (and at this rate I probs won't ever make that happen tbh). Also per animation has different options and they're all a bit weird and limited.

You can get animation specific options with something like

./command animation/help '{"animation_name": "twinkles"}'

which returns

  --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  twinkles animation
  --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  
  Twinkles on the tile!
  
  When this animation starts, the panels will fade away at different times
  to give a smooth transition from whatever is currently on the tile to
  the twinkles.
  
  Then the animation will shine dots over all the tiles. This will be pretty.
  
  Options that are recognised:
  
  twinkles_color_range - colour range - default rainbow
      The colours to choose from each time a twinkle is born.
  
  twinkles_max_percent - range - default to between 0.1 and 0.3
      This is a percentage of the total canvas that can have twinkles on it
  
  twinkles_percent_added_at_once - range - default to between 0.01 and 0.02
      This is the percentage of the total canvas that can have new twinkles
      added to it in a tick.
  
  fade_in_speed - range - default between 0.1 and 0.2
      The amount of brightness change per tick when the twinkle is going from
      starting brightness to full brightness
  
  fade_out_speed - range - default between 0.1 and 0.2
      The amount of brightness change per tick when the twinkle is going from
      full brightness to no brightness
  
  ================================================================================
  
  
  colour range options
      This can be used to specify a range of colours to choose from.
  
      "rainbow" is a special value and says every time this is used to create
      a new colour, any colour can be chosen.
  
      This can be a single value, a ':' separated string, or a list of
      values.
  
      A value is a ``(hue, saturation, brightness, kelvin)`` tuple of values
      which can be specified as one to 4 of those items. This is either a list
      or a comma separated string.
  
      For example: ``[0-180]`` is a all the hue values from 0 to 180 with
      a saturation of 1, a brightness of 1 and a kelvin of 3500.
  
      Or ``[0-180, 0-0.5]`` is all hue values from 0 to 180 combined with
      saturation values between 0 and 0.5, all with brightness 1 and kelvin
      3500.
  
      If a list of specifiers are given, then a random one is chosen from the
      list and then if that item can have multiple values, a random one of
      those is used.
  
  
  range options
      This can be used to specify a number in a range of values. The options
      given to this will determine exactly how the value is determined.
  
      In all cases, the values are either a single string or a list of strings
      where each string is ``<number>`` or ``<number>-<number>``.
  
      For example, ``["1-5", "7-10"]`` will give back a value either between
      1 and 5 or between 7 and 10, each time a value is requested.
  
      Note that the option that uses this may specify whether the value
      can be a float or an integer and maximum/minimum values.

And the way of specifying those options would be something like

this

./command help '{"command": "animation/start"}'
Command animation/start
=======================

Start an animation

For example::

    PUT /v1/lifx/command {
      "command": "animation/start",
      "args": {
        "matcher": {"label": "wall"},
        "animations": [["balls", {"num_seconds": 5}], "dice"],
        "run_options": {"reinstate_on_end": true, "animation_limit": 3}
      }
    }


Arguments
---------

matcher: string or dictionary
        What lights to target. If this isn't specified then we interact with all
        the lights that can be found on the network.

        This can be specfied as either a space separated key=value string or as
        a dictionary.

        For example,
        "label=kitchen,bathroom location_name=home"
        or
        ``{"label": ["kitchen", "bathroom"], "location_name": "home"}``

        See https://photons.delfick.com/interacting/device_finder.html#valid-filters
        for more information on what filters are available.

animations: (optional)
        The animations options!

run_options: (optional)
        The options for animations in general

identity: string (optional)
        Optional identity for the animation

So you probs want something like

./command animation/start '{"animations": [["twinkles", {"twinkles_color_range": "10-50", "fade_in_speed": "0.2-0.6"}]]}'

[obaldius]

Thanks a lot @delfick , I'll move on from here! It's just I really want to use your photons, it looks amazing tbh. Been using the HTTP api and willing to get rid of it.

[Final-Hawk]

Thanks a lot for that example. I would've never got to that. How did you get to that? Is there some clue somewhere in the docs?

I just ended up piecing Delfick's command example above together with the full curl command, using trial and error to see what worked.

[delfick]

these are the available options for that animation - https://github.com/delfick/photons/blob/main/modules/photons_canvas/animations/registered/twinkles.py#L8-L14

Finding a good mix of options is pure trial and error. That's how I set the defaults, by changing the values and running the animation and observing and changing values and repeat, etc.

[delfick]

that and also changing the code for the animation itself :p